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Lenny Interviews Magician Lance Burton

Magic has always been a major part of the entertainment scene in Las Vegas and no-one has had more success than Lance Burton who is now in his 13th year performing at the Monte Carlo in a theater named for him. I went to see his show the other night, the first time in more than a year and though it was a weeknight, the place was packed and the show ended with a well-deserved standing O.

You would think that putting on a show almost nightly for more than 12 years would get a little tiring, a little stale, but Burton has been able to keep his show fresh and his enthusiasm high.

Looking back over his run, he had this to say: “The past 13 years seems like it’s been a roller coaster ride for my show at the Monte Carlo. Opening night on June 21st , 1996 and the 10th anniversary on June, 21st, 2006 were two of the most memorable evenings for me. Celebrating the show’s opening and the 10th anniversary of the success of my show Lance Burton: Master Magician and the Monte Carlo Resort & Casino was a dream come true. I recall hundreds of VIPs, my colleagues in the magic world, my employees, the media and hotel-casino executives on two of the most festive nights of my life. It was also gratifying that my family could be with me.

“During the past 13 of the 25 years that I’ve been performing in Las Vegas, I’ve had the opportunity to produce and own five TV specials: On the Road, The Encounter, The Legend Begins, Top Secret and Young Magician’s Showcase.

He says the three most unforgettable minutes on stage occurred “when I did “The Death Tank” for The Encounter before a live audience. It was the most breath-taking and breath-holding escape that I’ve ever done while submerged in a tank full of water (the size of a telephone booth). I had to get out alive, but the tank was chained and locked shut while I was strapped into a regulation straitjacket. It was such a surreal experience as the audience sat on the edge of their seats.

“One of the neatest things about performing in a top hotel on the Las Vegas Strip was the celebrities who came to my show and I was able to meet. Carl Reiner was filming Ocean’s 11 and came in by himself to see the show. Film legend Tony Curtis who played Houdini came to the show and joined me on stage while I did the upside-down straitjacket escape dedicating the Houdini commemorative stamp for the United States Postal Service. Diane Keaton came to see the show with her grandchildren.

“I never thought I’d be on America’s Most Wanted, but John Walsh invited me to co-host the show. The late Don Knotts was one of my favorites and also had seen me at the Hacienda (where Mandalay Bay now sits). Nicholas Cage, Dana Carvey, Shaquille O’Neal, Criss Angel, Wayne Brady, Pete Rose, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Maria Shriver, Michael Jackson, Bruce Willis, Steve Martin, Hugh Jackman and Hugh O’Brian were some of the famous who took in my magic show.”

Along the way he and the show have been named “Best Entertainer,” “Best Showroom,” “Best Value,” “Best Family Show” and “Best Magician” numerous times in the annual Las Vegas Review-Journal‘s Best of Las Vegas….. “It was gratifying to be so recognized by the media. I also treasure awards from The Shriners, the Variety Club and Optiminists International along with many other charitable organizations. The real reward was giving back.”

And that he has, giving his time and talent free of charge to a number of charities in Las Vegas to help raise funds. It’s a great show. Don’t miss it when you’re in town.

Lenny Interviews Wayne Brady

It’s not easy for a young performer to make it to a Strip showroom, let alone stay there for any length of time, but for the multi-talented Wayne Brady, it’s just another step in his career. I recently talked to the man whose show – Wayne Brady: Making It Up — at The Venetian has become a “must-see” on everyone’s list.

He makes it clear from the outset, that despite his great success as a singer, dancer, impressionist etc., he is “first and foremost an actor.”

Making his decision to become an actor at the age of 16, Brady recounts that his drama school teacher in Orlando, where he grew up, also taught Wesley Snipes. “When I was doing a Shakespearean play, Wesley was just getting a big break and when he came and saw me, he gave me some incredible words of advice. He said, ‘Do as much as you can do.’

“I didn’t really understand it at the time, but when I started working, I realized okay, just because I’m an actor doesn’t mean that I can’t do other things. Let’s say they’re casting for a musical and you’re in a room with 15 other actors. Now, maybe they can out-act Al Pacino himself, but this is isn’t an Al Pacino vehicle, it’s West Side Story. I can get up and sing and dance and they can’t. So I get the job.

“Then there’s a call for a great comedic part and you’ve got a bunch of guys that can sing and dance, but can’t be funny. I can turn around and get that job and that’s the thing that kept me afloat for many years before I was lucky enough to land on a TV show.”

Brady said he bounced around and it was that bouncing that allowed him to pick up the skills to be able to be called an entertainer.

“Because there’s no shame in my game. When I couldn’t get an acting role, I was at a theme park, singing and dancing five times a day in the blazing heat in the Florida sun. When I wasn’t doing that, I was on a cruise ship singing and dancing. Or I’d be doing dinner theatre, horrible dinner theatre doing really low budget regional tours.

“I can do improv because not only have I done horrible dinner theatre, but I’ve also done Shakespeare and musical theatre and character work. But every single thing I did sharpened my skills so when I got a chance at the big time, I was ready.

“I’ve been 20 years in show business and it’s all the same to me today, in the best possible way, being able to do all these different things. As long as I am doing what I was built to do, it is a beautiful day.”

He certainly has been able to do what he was built to do. From getting on stage five nights a week “kicking butt” to shooting Don’t Forget the Lyrics, a top rated show on FOX, to going on the road, and recording CDs, he says, “I’m very fortunate and I get it, and that’s in the back of my head every day.”

He credits his big break to the hit TV show Whose Line Is It Anwyay? “I was in an improv troupe called the Houseful of Honkies. We had been a unit from Orlando and we all moved out to LA to be the next Second City. We finally lucked into a gig at the Acme Comedy Theatre. The producers of Whose Line heard about us, came to see us and invited us all to audition for the show.

“We show up and there were more than 100 people auditioning, and I really expected to be cut quite early. In fact, I went to the audition on my lunch break. I was working at Universal Studios doing the Beatlejuice Rock n Roll show and I said ‘Ok, I’m going to audition, I’ll probably be cut and I’ll be right back.’

“Needless to say, not only did I not get to go back to my shift that day, I got the gig and out of everyone who auditioned, I was the only person that got a regular slot on Whose Line, and it completely changed my life.”

Brady said that doing the show was like a comedy college. Before that, he said he had never considered himself a comedian or someone who could make people laugh. “I knew I could do characters because of my background, but I relied on them. Working with Colin (Mochrie) and Ryan (Styles), being thrown into situations and having me put on the spot by the producers was a real challenge. I’d never done impersonations before I worked on Whose Line. It just started one day when the card read, ‘Wayne, you are James Brown in the middle of a grudge match with Michael Jackson doing such and such.’

“The pressure was incredible because you never knew if you were going to get on a show or not. They would rehearse in workshop with various people, so almost like every rehearsal was your chance to prove that you belonged on that show. I am forever in debt to that show, the producers and Colin and Ryan for unlocking that talent.”

Brady said he never thought he’d achieve this level of success at this stage in his life. “I knew in my heart from the time I started as a kid, that I would always work as an actor or as a singer and my biggest dream at the time was that maybe one day I’ll get on Broadway. So everything that has happened to me has been an incredible frosting on the cake.

“So now I tend to shoot a little higher, thinking, if I can do all of this stuff, well why can’t I do more? I look at various film actors, or Broadway stars and say, ‘Why not me?’

“Getting a little older has also taught me that everything comes in its own time and with hard work, so while I continue to do the Vegas show, which has been a huge hit, I still have to hustle and make myself better just like the next guy. I can’t rest on my laurels.”

His goal, he said, is to play Sam Cook in a movie about the great singer. “Right now it’s on a back burner because of the Sam Cook estate. We’ve been trying for years. For many years I was represented by Bernie Brillstein, who just died, and even the great Bernie couldn’t bring Sam’s manager and his estate to want to do the film.

“It’s been kicking around for years and I really feel in my own heart that if there’s someone who can truly bring that story out and who loved Sam Cook, loved his music, sounds like him, and can do it, it’s me. That’s what my passion project is.”

As for his successful run at the Venetian that ends next July, he said, “Who knows what the future holds. I am an antsy person, but for right now, I’m having a great time. They love me, I love them and the audiences have really responded and the nice thing is that there are a lot of locals who come to the show. Can’t ask for much more than that.”

Lenny Interviews Carrot Top

The name Scott Thompson might not mean anything to you, but if you happen to drop into the Luxor in Las Vegas almost any night of the week, you‘ll see him performing his unique brand of wacky humor under his stage name–Carrot Top.

Since his days in his native Florida doing standup while in college, Carrot Top has become one of the most recognizable figures in entertainment, with his unruly mop of red hair and his national TV exposure doing the AT&T commercials a few years back. But he‘s most at home on stage, mixing standup comedy with a trunk full of his own odd and hysterical inventions. For example, high heels with training wheels and airline peanut bags with pictures of missing luggage on the back.

When I talked to the funny man, he said, “Nobody can steal my act. I’ve challenged comics to write me a prop and they can’t. Comedians have done plays on words but writing a visual joke is something else. A rubber chicken isn’t enough. I have to write my own material, make my own props, because no one sells what I do – like the paper-cup-and-string-telephone with a third cup for call waiting. I’m happy not only that I have my own style but I’ve been an original from the very start.” I didn’t say he was modest.

It wasn’t all a bed of roses for this talented guy. Early in his career, he said he quit out of frustration attempting to break into clubs. His car was finally repossessed and he took jobs delivering bread, cleaning office buildings, and even shucking oysters. A year later he ran into a club owner who said, “What do you mean you’re not doing comedy?” He offered Carrot Top his club’s New Year’s Eve gig in 1987. “I forgot just how much fun this is and that I could do it.”

Today, firmly entrenched at the Luxor on a long contract, Carrot Top is pretty happy with his life. Although he says that when he was younger he was this “very skinny redheaded freckled guy.” No more. The comedian got into working out and body building a few years ago and now he has a body that Arnold Schwarzenegger would praise.

I found him to be a very bright, thoughtful guy who liked to talk about a lot of things other than entertainment. The name Carrot Top stuck at a very early age, as that became his nickname with his friends and one that he found was very marketable. He knows something about marketing as he majored in it in university. He says, “I was stimulated by marketing and fascinated with how commercials would sell a product.”

As for his act, he says, “I think the more you do this and the more comfortable you become on stage, you start speaking more and becoming more of a character in yourself. I think the props just came about as my own little way of expressing myself on stage because I wasn’t really comfortable telling jokes. I think, over the years, I’ve kind of evolved.”

He says he’s not hyperactive like he is on stage and I can vouch for that. He’s actually soft-spoken and relaxed during an interview.

Carrot Top surprised me when he said that he thinks comics don’t like to see other comics do well. “Human beings like success, but they hate successful people. It’s weird, I never wish anything bad upon anybody, except two or three old girlfriends.”

As for the future, he says, “I try not to look too far into the future because I think that everything happens and will happen for a reason.” What has happened is that Carrot Top is one of Las Vegas’ top performers, so when you’re in town and you want a good laugh, catch his show.